


Death of the Laundry Forest

by icandrawamoth



Series: Polyship Week 2016 [3]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Domestic, Domestic Fluff, Fluff, I'm Bad At Titles, Laundry, Multi, NaNoWriMo, Polyamory, Polyship Week, Social Anxiety, Tumblr Prompt
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-23
Updated: 2016-08-23
Packaged: 2018-08-10 15:55:50
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 911
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7851532
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/icandrawamoth/pseuds/icandrawamoth
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Mel is a time machine technician, not a dryer repairwoman.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Death of the Laundry Forest

**Author's Note:**

> Written for polyshipprompts's Polyship Week, Day Three: Domestic, for [this prompt](http://polyshipprompts.tumblr.com/post/129948666340/imagine-the-dryer-in-your-polyships-apartment). Usually I can follow prompts a bit more closely; idk what's up with me this week. (I'm writing a lot more than usual, that's what's up, and it's awesome. ^_^)
> 
> This is based on and takes place after my NaNoWriMo novel from last year (which I really should clean up and post at some point). The backstory: Mel and Posey are two women in an established relationship working for a company that uses a time machine to give tours of historical times and events, Posey as a tour guide and Mel as a scientist programming the machine. An accident caused Beck, an American soldier in the Revolutionary War, to return with one of Posey's tour groups, and (due to hand-wavy timey-wimey Reasons) he was unable to go home. After moving in with the women while acclimating to his new time, he was eventually invited to join their relationship and did. (Also, more or less important character details: Mel is a black women, and Beck is dealing with social anxiety.)

When Mel opens the apartment door and steps inside, she's immediately slapped in the face by a wet shirt. She takes a steak back, blinking at the offending garment and trying to figure out why it's hanging there in front of the door.

She hears gigging and peers around the shirt to see Posey and Beck standing, the woman giggling and the man looking shyly amused. Around them is a forest of wet clothes - draped on furniture, on hangers hooked on any available outcrop, closed in cupboard doors...

"What exactly is going in in here?" Mel asks. 

"The one dryer in the building that was still working went out, which we didn't discover until after we'd washed," Posey explains, still clearly amused. "Beck had the brilliant idea to dry everything like they did in his time."

"I hope that's all right," the man adds anxiously, as if he's afraid Mel will be angry. 

"Sure," she says, carefully navigating the room to put her purse on the counter. "Doesn't sound like you had much of a choice. Did you call the super?"

"He wasn't happy," Posey confirms. "And no one can come out until Monday. Obviously he's been waiting as long as he can to avoid replacing any of the machines."

"I'd be better off fixing it myself," Mel grumbles.

"You'd probably be better than anyone they called anyway," Posey says hopefully. 

Mel gives her a look. "Are you really saying I should?"

"You did just get back from fixing a time machine," Beck points out. "This should be much simpler."

"I'm a scientist, not a dryer technician," Mel deadpans. 

The combined puppy-dog eyes her lovers give her is ridiculous. "We could clean up all this stuff if you did," Posey wheedles. "No more shirt-to-face incidents for you."

"And we'd have warm pajamas to sleep in?" Beck adds hopefully. It's one if the little things about modern living he's quickly grown to love.

Mel throws up her hands. "All right, you guys win, I'll take a look." The other two grin at each other like excited children. She gets the little tool kit they keep under the sink for the odd occasion when something needs to be done around the apartment, and the three of them head to the laundry area in the basement. 

As they walk, Posey has been tapping away at her phone. "Here's a list of possible reasons it won't work," she reads. A pause. "Most of these repairs seem pretty easy, anyway."

"Good." Mel plucks the phone out of her hand and scrolls down the list. "So did it not start at all or did it run but not heat up?"

"It kind of made a noise but didn't actually start," Beck explains. 

"An unusual noise," Posey clarifies, because Beck is still growing accustomed to some of the sounds of big city life in the twenty-first century. "Like it kind of growled and shook a little but didn't spin or anything."

Mel reads some more of the article. "Okay, so it doesn't sound like a faulty breaker or door switch or anything like that, and if it made noise, it was definitely plugged in..." She sets down her tools and takes out a flathead screwdriver. "The article says we should be able to open the top by doing this..." She kneels and presses the screwdriver in between the dryer's plating, quickly locating the mentioned clips and releasing them. She stands and pulls the top open, and the three of them peer inside.

"I've never seen the inside of a dryer before," Posey says with mild interest. 

"I've hardly seen a dryer at all," Beck adds somewhat dryly. 

Mel takes in the various tubes and circuitboards that surround the main drum of the machine. As familiar as she is with the intricate machinery she deals with at work, this is foreign. But then something catches her eye, and she reaches in. 

Her hand returns with a fistful of socks.

Posey bursts into laughter. "So that's what the sock gremlins do with them?"

"Gremlins?" Beck asks with wide eyes. 

Posey calms him by explaining the metaphor of socks going missing in the dryer as Mel fishes a sizable ball of lint and a few other odds and ends from the innards of the machine. 

"Do you think that was it?" Posey asks as Mel drops the top shut and pushes the start button. The dryer whirs to life, spinning and all. 

"Looks like it," Mel says, turning the machine back off. "I'm thinking with all that crap in there, it eventually got jammed and couldn't move anymore."

Posey pokes disconcertedly at the pile of stuff Mel had retrieved. "How did all that get in there anyway?"

"Who even knows. But you definitely didn't need a time machine technician to fix it."

Posey whacks her on the arm playfully. "But you know we appreciate you."

"Should we got get the clothes again, then, now that it's working?" Beck proposes. 

"And it won't even take two trips now that we're all here," Posey chirps.

"Yes, I really am good for something," Mel sighs, rolling her eyes fondly.

A few hours later, the clothes all dried, folded, sorted, and put away, the three of them are cuddled up on the couch together. Seeing Posey and Beck so adorably happy, Mel's heart is as warm as their fresh pajamas. Fixing a dryer is the very least she would do for these two, she decides.


End file.
